Sunday, May 25, 2014

The End Of An Era: 40K Is Dead

Well Dreadbeard, Spellduckwrong and Myself are hard at work giving the blog a face lift. We are changing
gear completely. 40K has gone in a direction we are not happy with. Although we are still holding onto our armies, 40K is now dead in our FLGS. So if you have been tuning in for 40K coverage is it going to be sparse at best from here on in. Coverage of War Machine and Hordes will be on the rise, as well as other games. First and foremost though we will be covering Firestorm Armada.

That said the name of the blog will also be changing. No longer will we be known as Craftworld Lansing. When the overhaul is done "The Waygate" shall be left in is place.

So I say goodbye to 40K and GW once again. In your quest to expand your business you have alienated many of your long time players, hobbyists and biggest supporters. Despite your status as the makers of the "Rolls Royce" of miniatures your obvious money grabbing at the expense of a decent game has me and many other fed up. 40K is no longer fun for me. I will still hobby and paint, but I will not buy any of your products from here on in. Your practices and excuses that you "are only a miniature company" when faced with criticism about your rules is tired and a cop out.

I invite everybody to still follow and read the blog even if 40K is your only game. Its good to know what else is out there. If you part ways with us, thanks for reading. We appreciate our followers and readers and you guys are why we do this. Sometimes when you love something you have to it go. I have been a 40K player and hobbyist for over 20 years. I left once and it was not because of the game, but rather the hypocrisy of GW when I was let go in 2000 from the company. Now I leave because of the game and the companies attitude. We now start a new path and don the mantels of Field Marshals and Admirals.

May Cegorach guide your path and Khaine bless your sword. and for the last time.

It would seem our cousins in the southern hemisphere have been abused a little more than the rest of us, so kudos for keeping the faith Crazy. Thanks for the well wishes, the blog will still be around, just with a different focus.

Yeah, and it wouldn't surprise me at all if they actually sold a few of those bundles too. Must be nice to have that kind of disposable income. Personally, even if I had the money to buy a chapter, I think I would be absolutely overwhelmed by the sheer amount of plastic and resin I would then have. I can paint diligently, but that is beyond what my fragile mind could handle. Though, if I did have that money burning a hole in my wallet, I could probably scrounge some up to get it commission painted as well.

Fair enough really, there's no point in forcing yourself to pay something you don't enjoy or don't feel you can support. I will be waiting to see how 7e pans out, and have been getting into X-wing for a change of pace since March. Thanks for all the 40k content you guys put out, it was one of my favourite sources of good competitive thinking! Cheers chaps and good work.

And thanks for reading! It's an odd feeling to let it go, been playing for years now but I guess all things end with time.Never tried X-Wing but Firestorm Armada sure is filling my spaceship wants and needs. Soon enough, Planetfall will be released and then I will have a linked space game and ground game.

Not counting a few Combat Patrol games, I think I have literally played three real games since UCON. I haven't seen GW's sales figures, but they seem to be doing ok. We just don't seem to be their target audience anymore. The game is changing and for some, that will be wonderful. Others like us will just have to tip our hat and move on to other things.

Honestly I don't think we ever were. GW have actively and explicitly discouraged competitive tournament play for years now. It's just that 5th was tight enough and stable for long enough for independent parties to promote competitive play and set up events for this audience.

As has been mentioned in various places before, GW just aren't interested in what they see as a minority group (competitive players) and can't see the benefits of a tight reset for players at every level.

Perhaps 7th is a tighter ruleset but even if this is the case, the chances of the community settling on an accepted 'standard' version of the game to allow players to take their armies to multiple events without having to adapt to 101 variations of comp are looking slim!

Time will tell though, but for now I simply don't have the resources (funds or time) to adapt to such a rapidly changing ruleset. Nothing wrong with trying new things and a change is healthy now and again!

First half sales June 2013 to December 2013 where down 10% and profits were down 30% from the previous year (2012 over the same period). It is not an accident that the 7th edition was released 1 or 2 weeks before the close of their fiscal year as opposed to in the summer like they have released 5th and 6th and several recent WHFB editions.

Can you post a link to this data, Eriochrome? I would like to take a look-see. That seems really bizarre to me though I do suppose it matters significantly on what their profit margin was on the 6th ed rulebook which would have been sold during that 2012 period used for comparison.Oh, no, I'm under no impressions that the 7th ed release was an accident. I think your assertion of their timing motive is dead on, but that's just business as usual when you have stock holders..

GW half year and full year statements are available on their investor relations page:http://investor.games-workshop.com/

The most recent half year is here.http://investor.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/2013-14-Press-statement-final-released.pdf

Revenue 60.5 M vs 67.5 MProfit 7.7 M vs 11 M.

Stockholders would like to see a steedy increase in sales and such so moving up what would have been released in the next year to hit this years targets just makes next year tougher though. Think about what was released in June-Dec 2012 you get the the 40K sixth edition dropped while no mystery boxes or new editions were launched June-Dec 2013 but GW was releasing codexes and other books are a much accelerated rate.

I agree that their numbers are down from this time last year. After reviewing their reports, I don't see anything particularly worrisome in there, though. Their operating cash flow is good and they are still turning a hefty profit.Some investors probably do want that, others probably wanted a spike in share prices so they could make an oodle of cash after picking up shares in March when their share price was in the toilet.Regardless of how their business practices are perceived, I stand by my original statement that "they seem to be doing ok".

This was the report that caused the share prices to drop. They have not shown an ability to grow the business recently so their stock is pretty much valued based on earnings and dividends. Some speculate that GW is manage the business for cash generation as they see 3D printing undermining their margins in the near future.

I see. Well, I definitely agree that 3D printing does indeed present a looming threat to them, all model companies actually. The coming years will be very interesting to watch, as new technology fundamentally changes the distribution of miniatures and the business models of game companies.

And there is probably wisdom in your words, Sentinel. 5th did run for a long time, was stable, and had great third party rules support like the INAT. Maybe it just created the illusion that competitive play was more achievable than it actually was in the long run.

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